Fashion Victims
by Ms. Videl Son
Summary: ThreeShot. There was no time to congratulate himself now, though, as ChiChi was winding up for another swing. “B-But I got another job! A better-paying one!” GhVi.


**Title: **Fashion Victims  
**Disclaimer:** I just provide the cheap knockoffs, sorry.  
**Rating:** PG-13 ( T ) – for mild cursing, a touch of yaoi and fashion fads that'll make your eyes bleed.  
**Spoilers:** Nada. You even get to ignore the entire Buu Saga for this one.

**Summary:** ThreeShot. There was no time to congratulate himself now, though, as ChiChi was winding up for another swing. "B-But I got another job! A better-paying one!" GhVi.

My fanfiction entry for SweetestIrony's August contest. Theme – Summer Work.

Here's to you, RyRy. Thanks for the help.

* * *

**Part One:** Fashionably Late

Gohan sighed as he removed the paper hat from his spikes, weary and disappointed in himself. "Not again...Mom's going to hit the roof when she finds out," he complained quietly to himself, trudging away from his latest place of employment.

Much like his previous three attempts at joining the part-time work force, Gohan's latest job at Burger Hut had lasted less than a week. It had all started out fine until...BOOM! There went the Fry-o-Later. Those industrial-grade fryers sure were flimsy, in one demi-Saiyan's opinion...

Well, it hardly mattered anymore. What was demolished was demolished and there was no way for him to change what had happened. And, on the bright side, Burger Hut's assistant manager hadn't been able to provide solid proof of Gohan being the sole cause of damage to the fast food restaurant (apparently, the police had deemed it impossible for a single teenaged boy to puncture a hole in the metal frame of a full-sized, heavy-duty fryer by simply rubbing a little too hard with a dirty rag), so there would be no criminal charges pressed. He'd been fired on the spot, of course, but at least his spotless criminal record remained clean.

Gohan still rather doubted that his mother would see this as a silver-lining, however. "Son Gohan!" she'd say, utilizing his full name for dramatic emphasis. "This is the third job you've lost in_ two weeks_! How do you expect our family to survive if you can't hold down a position long enough to get a paycheck?"

Though the screeching voice inside his head made him wince in shame, he had to admit that the conjured image of ChiChi had a point. With no more of Goku's Budokai winnings left to lean on and the family money from Ox King running on short supply, the Son family was in financial trouble. If he didn't get a job (and keep it), they might actually run the risk of running out of_ food_. With a dietary requirement of two metric tons (at minimum) of comestibles a day between himself and Goten, they could all starve within a week. Not only that, but the neighboring villages that depended on their patronage would (probably) be left bankrupt without their extra-large weekly orders...it was true, Gohan _had _to get a paying job. And fast.

"_Saiyaman, please report to the Satan City police station...Saiyaman, please report to the Satan City police station..._"

"Huh?" Gohan queried to no one in particular, looking up to the sky as the name of his superhero alter-ego was called out of seemingly nowhere. Upon further investigation of the immediate vicinity, however, he deduced that the disembodied voice was coming out of speakers embedded into the sides of the buildings around him, which were generally used to soothe window shopping customers with easy listening tunes. It seemed that the police were commandeering a local radio station to utilize it as their own personal PA system.

"_...Saiyaman, please report to the Satan city police station..._"

O...kay. Well, ChiChi probably wouldn't like the fact that he was donning his Saiyaman costume again ("Get a _paying_ job, Gohan! This family can't live off of your charity work!"), but he loved to help people in need and it would give him a chance to dawdle on his way home. He wasn't terribly motivated to rush home and tell his mother about his most recent firing, after all.

Decision quickly made, Gohan swerved his head from side to side to make sure that nobody was paying attention to the average-looking boy in the bright red and orange uniform before ducking stealthily into a convenient alleyway. Once within the concealing shade of the building schism, he gleefully pressed the special red button on the side of his wristwatch and waited the customary two-point-three seconds for his transformation to take effect.

"Alright!" Gohan cheered, standing up from behind the trash can that had sheltered him while he changed. "Let's do this!"

With that final excited utterance, he took to the air and began flying in the general direction that he kinda/sorta thought the police station was in.

— — —

"L-Let me explain, Mom!" Gohan pleaded, scooting backwards across ChiChi's perfectly polished floor on his rear end until he felt the living room wall against his shoulders. Unfortunately, he was still well within range of the Frying Pan of Doom and was forced to flatten himself on the ground to avoid it as his mother made another swipe for his head.

"This is the third job that you've lost in _two weeks_, Gohan!" she scolded, pulling the weaponized kitchen paraphernalia out of the cracking plaster. "How is our family supposed to survive if you can't earn even one paycheck before getting fired?"

Wow, he'd been able to guess her words almost verbatim. There was no time to congratulate himself now, though, as ChiChi was winding up for another swing. "B-But I got another job! A better-paying one!"

The Son matriarch's eyebrow rose until it nearly touched her hairline after his last peacemaking proclamation. "Oh?" she asked, curiosity evident in her voice (though she kept the frying pan held aloft anyway).

"Y-Yeah," Gohan replied, grateful to whatever gods might be watching down on him that she was finally amicable to listening. "The police asked me – well, they asked Saiyaman, actually – to help guard someone famous that's coming into town next week. He needs extra security for some big event that he's hosting."

Slowly, the Frying Pan of Doom dropped from its position over ChiChi's head and came to rest in her hands at chest-level. "How much?" she asked, her voice at a more tolerable level now.

Confused, he answered his mother with another question. "How much of...what?"

"_Money_, Gohan," she snapped, grip tightening on the handle of her multi-use culinary instrument. "How much will you be earning?"

"Oh! Uh...," Gohan had to think back to what the police chief had told him before he could answer. "200 Franks per hour, I think. I'm not sure what that is in Zenni." ( 1 )

"That's...," ChiChi paused to look up at the ceiling, her lips moving while soundless numbers passed through them. "Twenty Zenni an hour. How long would you be working per day?"

"Um...," Gohan really wished he could come up with these answers faster. Yet again, his mother was glaring at him expectantly and fondling her frying pan menacingly. "Well, I'd be there from eleven AM to midnight, – not including the potential for overtime – so that would be...thirteen hours a day for seven days. Overall, I should earn at least 1,820 Zenni."

ChiChi appeared to be thinking over the information Gohan had just passed onto her, the numbers undoubtedly rattling around in her head as she considered them. "Well...that would cover us for about a month, maybe. Is there any chance of getting a more permanent position?"

"I don't think so," Gohan admitted, sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck. "But at least it's something to tide us over until I can get something else. That's a start...right?"

The Son matriarch sighed and finally lowered the Frying Pan of Doom completely out of attack stance. "I suppose. Do a bit of job hunting while you're in town, though."

"Sure thing, Mom," the eldest demi-Saiyan agreed quickly, relief flushing throughout his system as she turned to walk back into the kitchen, weapon/cooking implement hanging harmlessly by her side.

Gohan sat on the floor for the next few minutes, allowing his heart to begin beating at it's regular pace again. That had been a close one, despite bringing home a fairly decent silver lining to accompany his dark clouds. Gohan made a mental note to always give ChiChi the_ good _news first from then on.

— — —

True to academic form, Gohan was late for work the next morning. Though he had set both of his alarms to go off in plenty of time for him to get a quick shower and down a light breakfast of two dozen pancakes, he'd slept through them both and had only gotten up with barely enough time to brush his teeth, don his uniform and zip out the front door at top speed.

"Oh, man! Why do I keep doing this to myself?" he grouched as he came in for an unbalanced landing at the site chosen for...whatever event it was he was supposed to be attending all week.

It had been difficult understanding the police chief when he'd gotten to that part of explaining his assignment because, for some funny reason, he seemed to be trying not to laugh (he failed pretty horribly at it, too). Gohan supposed that he should have asked the chief to repeat himself, but figured it didn't really matter all that much either way. He was sure that he'd find out what he was in for as soon as he got to his new place of employment and, besides, he was just supposed to protect someone, not worry about what they did for a living.

The aerial view of the event area had given him few clues as to what the occasion was about as the entire grassy venue was covered with nondescript white tents and there were no signs posted anywhere to give him any information. There were certainly a lot of people around, though, most of them wearing solid black T-shirts and shouting obscenities into hands-free microphone headsets. After he'd touched down just on the outskirts of the site, it became practically impossible to stop one of them in order to ask directions to where he was supposed to be.

"Excuse me?" he'd ventured toward no fewer than seven people before finally getting a response.

The woman who finally responded to his desperate pleas for assistance was hardly in an accommodating mood. "Not now! Can't you see I'm busy?"

"Oh, I'm sorry, I just need to know...," Gohan's sentence trailed off as he watched the woman scurry away from him to duck into one of the many tents, screeching into her headset. "Um...Okay, I'll try someone else, then."

After three more people flat-out ignored him in lieu of carrying out their own business, Gohan was starting to get nervous. When he checked his watch, he discovered himself to be a full fifteen minutes late, which didn't bode well for his eventual timestamp.

Spotting one person – a stick-skinny girl with a vibrantly-colored scarf tied around her head – that was standing completely still near the open mouth of a nearby tent, he hurriedly dashed over to her and tapped the girl on her bony shoulder. She jumped and spun around to face him, shouting, "I've got a pass!"

"O-Okay," Gohan replied, slowly withdrawing his hand from the girl (who, now that he looked closer, appeared to be an effeminate-looking man instead). "I was just wondering where Cotore-san's tent was."

The girly man, dainty hand pressed against his heart, took a moment to reply as he caught his breath. "You mean Monsieur Couture?" ( 2 )

"Oh...yeah, that sounds right. Do you know where he is?"

With a frightfully skinny finger, the girly man pointed at the tent he had been peeking into. "In there, sweetie."

"Great, thanks!" Gohan exclaimed with a broad grin, dashing past his savior and through the open flap that worked as a door.

Once inside the canopy of the tent, Gohan stopped to stare in slight awe at what he found. Everything – from the wooden folding chairs to the long carpeted walkway that ran right up the center of the makeshift room – was colored a bright, brilliant alabaster and glared in the heavy-duty spotlights that hung from the metal rafters above him. It was like walking into a poorly-stocked hospital with no patients. At times such as these, Gohan considered himself lucky that his visor was tinted because, were his eyes completely unprotected against the violent blaze of whiteness, he was certain that he would have suffered some sort of permanent damage to his retina.

The only slight variation in his overwhelmingly light surroundings was a simple banner stretched across the front of the tent, right above a gigantic screen placed at the end of the runway. It read simply, in black loopy script, "FASHION WEEK."

"You're late,_ Mr. Saiyaman_."

— — —

**Footnotes: **

( 1 ) Franks – Before anybody reviews and tells me that the (former) French currency is spelled "Franc," you should know that I'm already aware of this. "Frank" with a k is just my stupid little pun since France doesn't exist at all in the DBZ-verse** n.n**

Also, in my story "Zenni" will be approximately equal to the American dollar or the Euro. Pick whichever you like.

( 2 ) Couture – a French phrase that basically means "dressmaking" or "sewing/needlework." The complete phrase – Haute Couture – refers to high fashion, generally made by hand.

—

**Author's Notes:** Man, I hope all of my math is correct. Normally, my arithmetic can't be trusted...**n.n**;

Ahem, anyway, I'm basically guaranteed to finish this story by the end of the month b/c of the whole contest deadline thing. Still, y'all should wish me luck and cross your fingers.

Oh, and just in case anybody was wondering, YES, I do watch _Project Runway_. It's my favorite reality TV show ever (not that I like too many more, but there you go). I know next to nothing about fashion, but I enjoy watching people make interesting clothes anyway.

You guys let me know how I'm doing so far.

_**. ( . Ms Videl Son . ) .**_

– _Who's your daddy? GohanVidel_


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